“After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb.”  Matthew 28:1 NIV

These women had witnessed how Jesus had brought healing, deliverance and a message of hope to the people around them. Mary Magdalene had personally experienced Jesus’ miraculous touch in her life and her own deliverance. Yet when “at dawn of the first day of the week” they went to look for Jesus in the tomb.

Today is the first day of the 21 days of Prayer & Fasting. You have known God’s faithfulness in your life. You have experienced Jesus’ salvation and His deliverance. You have known the leading of the Holy Spirit.

Perhaps you have not fully experienced all of His deliverance. You are still uncertain when the Holy Spirit is leading you. Nevertheless, in this first day of the 21 day of Prayer & Fasting don’t revisit your dead places.

Dead places are those circumstances, situations and experiences in your life that cast shadow over you, engulf you in the hopelessness of no tomorrow and limit your ability to rise up with Jesus.

Today, as you pray, do not pray your past or your present. Declare your future.

Today, “at the dawn of the first day”,  look up towards the heaven from where your help comes.

Pray Psalm 121.

“God, you are the Maker of heaven and earth, my help comes from you. I will lift my eyes to you. You, Heavenly Father, will not let me slip, you will watch over me. You, who do not sleep, You, oh, Lord you watch over me. You are a shade at my right hand -wow, Lord, you are my armor bearer!  Nothing obvious will harm me and nothing hidden will harm me. You watch over ALL my life. You are going to keep an eye on me whether I am coming or going, not just today but always!

Today, God, I am going to look for you among the living – smiles, acts of kindness, prayer moments, random compassion, deliberate forgiveness. Today, God, when people look for you, help me to introduce them to your Son, Jesus, who lives in me and when they seek to find Him, may they find Christ in me (Colossians 1:27), the hope of glory – the full manifestation of your love!”